Field drains

[DNgroundworks]

Been racking my brains over this but i cant work it out.

Got a problem at my mates equestrian place, he had some drainage done - 4 x lengths of 150mm perf pipe about 80 mtrs long joined into bigger drain along the edge of the field.

For some reason they didnt work at all, a huge 100ft square lake appeared right over the top of the drain runs.

I couldnt work it out, so i dug down where i could see the trenches, to the gravel on all four drain runs and dug channels back to the artificial pond and low and behold all the water drained.

Why is it not draining through the top soil capping? in some places the soil is around 2ft deep but mostly around a foot?

And the outfall, a few hundred metres away is around 6ft lower than the field?

Cheers.

[mickg]

this seems to cover issues of soil drainage

sports turf drainage

[montygti]

Sounds just like our stables fields, What we ended up doing was using a thing that makes slits in the top soil(cant remember what its called) and then added sand just using a fertilizer spreader and the used the chain harrow to basically move the sand into the slits that has been created. Did it a couple of times and did the trick. We put it down to heavy clay soil.

[DNgroundworks]

Cheers Mick, but i am none the wiser!

According to that website, im going to have to put in a complicated system.....i dont even know what heavy loam soil is!

I might email the Boss, or, if he reads this, id love to know what he thinks.

[lutonlagerlout]

patently the water is not getting through the topsoil
are the pipes wrapped in teram?
what type of gravel was used?
I have seen similar done in clay and the water scoots through it
LLL

[lemoncurd1702]

Mole plough or subsoiler run at 45 or 90 (not sure which) to your land drains. This will break up the compacted soil similar to what montygi suggests but at a greater depth.
An Agricultural contractor would have the correct implements and maybe able to advise further.

Good luck

[msh paving]

the horses have trod the ground hard, as lemoncurd said a mole plough or a farmer with a pan buster with flat lifters to get ground open and free, might even pay to pan bust whole paddock and reseed MSH

[ajmoore1]

As said the soil has compacted after having horses running over it over years. Bet the ground hasn't been ploughed for years.

Get a pan buster or mole plough and go at 90 degrees to the drains you put in. Hopefully your drains will be below the depth of pan bust/mole plough. If drains aren't deep enough an aerator would work but would need doing more often.

Good agricultural contractor would be able to tackle it no problem

Regards

Jon

[GB_Groundworks]

We've got mole ploughs that'll do 1 metre deep but need big hp and good ground, or a verti drainer that spikes the ground or a blec slitter that you then use to sand band, both need a big tractor preferable on lgp tyres. We do the rugby club pitches every Year with these to break the compaction of all the big lads running around

Alternatively what we do to top out the drains in bad ground like this is bring the stone to the surface, using 40-100 clean or better but trickier solution gravel upto 8" of the service then Terram then we use a mix of loamy soil and course sand to make a free draining soil up mix it up with machine 1 bucket of each



Edited By GB_Groundworks on 1423554382

[GB_Groundworks]

If you need some to do it give James a call at Pugh-Lewis he's got all the kit does a lot of work on the sports pitches etc real knowledgable guy.

[GB_Groundworks]

heres james blec ground breaker he lends us slitting our pitches pro to 80 tons sports sand per pitch being top dressed into the holes this makes, it can also have a hopper attached directly









you could also use the gravel bander http://www.blec.co.uk/gravel-bander



Edited By GB_Groundworks on 1423556990

[GB_Groundworks]

http://youtu.be/MY6d1H5SBfg

[DNgroundworks]

Wow, Cheers Giles.

Ive got plan, let me know what you think.

Upon further inspection two of the four drains are a bit naff tbh out fall in the wrong place etc. So what im thinking is soil strip the paddock, re-profile the clay to suit (levels are all over the place at the minute) install new drains. Put soil back mixed with a suitable sand, power harrow and re-seed?

Its not a huge field, not even a field just a small paddock. so i think rather than trying to make good...im just going to start from scratch.